Tracey is what you would call a Great Dane enthusiast. With four of these lovely dogs, you’d have to be! When she contacted me about photographing her babies in Melbourne, I was thrilled. Great Danes are ‘my breed’ and I was really looking forward to meeting some more and spending some quality time with them.

This Great Dane family lives in South Frankston in Melbourne so we took a trip to the local pier (complete with trailer-load of all four Danes) for the session. Melbourne turned on the blue skies, perfect temperatures and lovely evening light which made for a great atmosphere for the photos.

A quick note to future clients – in many of these photos you’ll see leads on the dogs – sometimes this is unavoidable in public areas like this! I’m more than happy to do a bit of tricky Photoshopping and remove them on the ones you wish to use as wall art or prints, however to do it to every shot would take me months, so I just leave them in until the final ordering stage when it’s decided if they’ll be used or not.

Alexa is two years old and affectionately referred to as the Elle McPherson of the bunch. You can see why, with those long supermodel legs and elegant neck.

She is very pretty, but also quite a devious and naughty little thing! The stories Tracey told me about her remind me so much of my Kaya, that same calcuating, clever way of looking at things. Brains as well as beauty!

I just love this shot of her.

And who can resist the famous Dane ‘helicopter ears’.

It’s easy to see how much Tracey loves all her Danes, bestowing them with frequent kisses and cuddles.

Another regal shot of ‘Princess’ Alexa. The funky architecture of the bridge makes for a fantastic background!

Next in line were the oldest and the youngest of the pack – Kiki who is 8 years old and such a gorgeous, gentle soul. And little (said with tongue firmly in cheek of course) 8 month old Jackson. We took a stroll up the pier with these two. The shot below is one of my favourites from the session – a standoff between the Danes and the boys further up!

Kiki is pretty amazing. Great Danes generally age more quickly than most other smaller breeds and unfortunately tend to live shorter lives. Kiki however is doing fantastic for a lady of her age! She impressed me no end with an agile leap up into the back of the 4wd, easy as pie!

At 8 months and already taller than Kiki and Alexa, Jackson is still such a baby and easily intrigued by the simple things in life, such as birdies flying overhead.

What a handsome boy though! His occupation is a show dog and he’s already proving to be a star, with many great results under his collar, and many more to come.

I love this tangle of legs, tails and ears as we walked further up the pier.

With Jackson pausing to watch some activity in the water further out.

Back on the beach, a rock wall provided a chance for Jackson to stand up tall and look like the big regal Great Dane he is (with plenty of cuddles of encouragement from his Mum of course).

On the beach, he found a little nut that took up his attention for a good 10 minutes.

Everyone must know by now how much I LOVE head wrinkles – well this boy was a goldmine of them! How smooshable is this face!

Jackson’s distraction gave us a bit more time for Kiki who posed it up, reminding us that she too used to be a successful show dog in her day and still has it.

Last but certainly not least, the adorable Tyson. The perfect gentle giant, he is much more concerned with being cruisy and relaxed, than looking nice and alert for us for photos. After lots of time and patience though we did manage to get some beauties, thanks to some other dogs who were being walked along the pier that managed to grab his attention.

Tyson wasn’t going to miss out on cuddles either. This probably gives you a good idea of his size, he’s a very big boy!

Right at the end of our session when the light was on the verge of running out, I snapped off a few shots like this. Just perfect – even including the rising moon!

As you’d expect, taking four gorgeous Great Danes to a public place like this does attract some attention. The number of people that wanted to stop and get cuddles from the dogs and ask the inevitable questions was staggering. We were originally counting the ‘horse’ comments but ended up losing track – just goes to show the impact these regal dogs have on people. To finish off, here’s a few shots of them being loved and admired by people and dogs alike.